Clippers and Thunder square off again Wed. night
Probably the biggest focus right now for the Oklahoma City Thunder is not taking their foot off the gas.
Seeing the Los Angeles Clippers should be a good reminder of that issue.
The biggest of all the recent blown leads by the Thunder came last week against the Clippers, who have been superior at closing out games behind Chris Paul and will try to do it again Wednesday night in Oklahoma City.
A 3-6 record since the All-Star break has caused concern for the Thunder and let Los Angeles (41-21) pull within 1 1/2 games of them for third place in the Western Conference. Oklahoma City needs a high-profile win considering its 3-9 record against the top four teams from each conference, with the only victory since Christmas coming against Miami.
The Clippers, meanwhile, have three such wins in just the past month.
That doesn't mean the Thunder (43-20) haven't had prime chances for that kind of confidence-building results.
They lost to Golden State despite leading by nine late in the third quarter Thursday, five days after wasting a late 11-point lead in a loss to the Warriors. In between, Oklahoma City led by as many as 22 in Los Angeles and by 16 with eight minutes left in last Wednesday's 103-98 loss to the Clippers.
"Once we learn how to really put the whole 48 minutes together, I think we'll be a dangerous team," said Thunder guard Dion Waiters, shooting 5 for 23 in the last three games. "We're still dangerous right now, but we're still learning.
"Times like this, we need to go through. We need to face adversity."
Top contenders aren't the only teams the Thunder have struggled to finish off since the break. They blew a seven-point lead in the final 2 1/2 minutes against Indiana, squandered a halftime lead in a loss at New Orleans and had trouble putting away Milwaukee on Monday.
The Thunder were ahead by 21 with under six minutes left in the third, let the lead slip to five points entering the fourth and struggled to hold off the lowly Bucks 104-96.
Coach Billy Donovan feels his team is having some "self-induced lapses."
"I think the (mistakes) we've gotta try to eliminate is sometimes when we're generating the momentum changing in the favor of the other team," he said.
That happened against the Clippers last week, when Paul had five of his 13 assists during the late rally.
Paul scored 18 of his 27 points in the game-changing third quarter of a 109-90 win in Dallas on Monday and finished a season-best 12 of 18 from the field.
"When it's going like that, I'm just trying to force the action," Paul said after Los Angeles' fourth win in five games.
As Blake Griffin remains sidelined, Paul has stepped up his point production with an average of 24.8 in the last 10 games along with 11.1 assists.
"We are very fortunate we get to witness greatness on pretty much a nightly basis," teammate J.J. Redick said of Paul.
Whereas Paul becoming more selfish has sometimes lifted Los Angeles to wins, counterpart Russell Westbrook doing the same hasn't benefited the Thunder. Westbrook has hoisted more than 20 field-goal attempts in each of the Thunder's past four defeats. Their only two wins on a recently completed four-game road trip came when he had fewer than 10 attempts, and Oklahoma City is 14-0 when he takes fewer than 15.
While Westbrook shot 8 of 21 against the Clippers, Kevin Durant was 12 for 27 as Oklahoma City shot 39.8 percent - its lowest mark in 2016.
Durant had 30 points and 11 rebounds that day, among his current stretch of six straight double-doubles, but had five turnovers. He's committed 20 in the last three games but had at least 30 points in each.
